Hans Bellmer - Louise BourgeoisDouble Sexus

Bodies morph and dissolve, limbs go missing, while others multiply; male and female sexual forms merge into each other and give birth to androgynous beings - the sexually charged work of Hans Bellmer (1902-1975) and Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010) bare many striking parallels to each other.

Although their paths crossed in Paris during the Surrealist heyday, Hans Bellmer, who fled to Paris from Nazi Berlin in 1938, and Louise Bourgeois, who in the same year made the move from Paris to New York, never actually met each other in person. Both artists created their respective oeuvres in relative reclusion before subsequently becoming known to a wider audience in their later years. Now for the first time, the Sammlung Scharf-Gerstenberg has created a dialogue between over 70 sculptural, graphic and photographic works by the two artists. Entitled 'Double Sexus', the exhibition sees the meeting of dolls and prostheses, with inviting glances gazing back at ballooning forms. Female fantasies and male fears, the ambiguous nature of everything sexual and the links between eroticism and creativity form the central topics of the exhibition. In the show, a display case is also dedicated to Hans Bellmer's illustrations for Georges Bataille's 'Story of the Eye', accompanied by a series of Louise Bourgeois's current works from 2009.

Alongside works from the Scharf-Gerstenberg's own collection, loans from international collections and from Louise Bourgeois's own studio will also be on display. The exhibition will then travel to the Gemeentemuseum in Den Haag.

The exhibition has been made possible thanks to support from the Verein der Freunde der Nationalgalerie.